The invention concerns a cleaning mechanism consisting of a cleaning device which incorporates a mop head with a cleaning head of absorbent mop material rigidly connected to a handle as well as a squeezing strainer mounted on a pail, whereby an edge of the mop head can be made to engage under a retainer bar on the edge of the squeezing strainer, in order to form a fulcrum for performing a squeezing motion of the mop head.
The squeezing of the cleaning mop serves to squeeze out the excess water absorbed during insertion of the cleaning mop into the pail. To do that, the edge of the mop head is hooked under the retainer bar on the edge of the squeezing strainer to form the fulcrum about which the mop head is swivelled by a swiveling movement of the handle. That causes the cleaning mop to be pressed between the lower side of the mop head and the strainer surface. In a known cleaning mechanism of this type (Campbell U.S. Pat. No. 3,341,876) the lower side of the mop head and the strainer surface are flat, as in other well known cleaning mechanisms. That results in an uneven squeezing of the overall cleaning mop (e.g., a sponge) during the swiveling movement of the mop head, because the portion of the mop spaced farthest from the fulcrum is compressed less than the portion located closest to the fulcrum. In addition, a relatively large movement of the handle is required to attain the required swiveling of the mop head.
The rigid connection of the handle to a mop head provided with a flat lower side dictates that a certain predetermined angle of the handle be maintained in relation to the surface to be washed. The handling of the cleaning device is thus made difficult, because the user must adapt his body position to this required handle position.
In order to achieve a parallel motion of the flat lower side of the mop head relative to the flat strainer surface, it is already known (British Patent 330,543) how to position the mop head on the handle by means of joints and how to incorporate, on an extension of the handle, an edge that engages under the retainer bar. The joint connection between the handle and the mop head, however, makes guiding and pressing of the mop head during the washing procedure difficult.
In another known cleaning mechanism (EPO-0 122 675) the mop head, incorporating a flat lower side, is connected to the handle by means of a universal joint, so that a parallel positioning of the mop head to the surface to be washed is guaranteed for any desired handle direction. As a result, however, a concentrated pressing a corner or edge of the cleaning mop against the surface to be washed is not possible. The squeezing strainer manifests a convex arched strainer surface on which the mop head can be rolled using a relatively expensive guide device, in order to improve the squeezing of the cleaning mop.
It is the task of this invention to achieve comfortable and effective handling of a cleaning mop during the washing procedure with a simple construction of the cleaning device and the squeezing strainer, on the one hand, and whereby an effective and uniform squeezing of the mop can be performed.